The present invention generally relates to ophthalmic instrument delivery systems and lighting systems designed to work in conjunction with such instrument systems. The invention is more particularly directed to a programmable room lighting systems which operate in conjunction with various ophthalmic instruments.
In the practice of ophthalmology, it has been common for both the doctor and patient to be seated and to provide the doctor with an instrument delivery table which may hold two different ophthalmic instruments. The table may be shifted between two positions to present one or the other of the instruments directly in front of the patient. Various prior systems have been proposed and utilized and some of these systems allow the instrument delivery table to be rotated into position in front of the patient while others allow the table to be moved laterally from a stored position into an operative position in front of the patient. An example of an ophthalmic instrument support which allows three distinct movements including rotational movement from a stored position to an operative position, longitudinal movement to present one or the other of two ophthalmic instruments in front of the patient and vertical movement to allow adjustment of the instruments relative to the height of the patient and the doctor is found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,643,547.
Drawbacks of prior instrument delivery tables include difficulty in adjusting the various positions of the table, including the inability to infinitely adjust within a predetermined range of movement as well as the lack of an ability to adjust the position of the table toward and away from the patient in a direction perpendicular to the longitudinal movement between the two instrument positions. This would be helpful, for example, to accommodate for the various size ranges of patients that will be seated in the examining chair.
Various ophthalmic examination systems have also included lighting control systems which adjust the room lights to a preset intensity when a particular instrument is activated. These systems have generally been designed so that the activation of a given instrument automatically sets the room lighting conditions in accordance with a dimmer which is preset and prewired to the particular instrument. The main drawback of such systems has been the inability of the doctor to easily program each of the many instruments and electrical controls to activate a desired room lighting condition in accordance with his or her particular needs or desires. Such previous lighting control systems may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,724,931 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,832,041 as well as in the model 905 "Pendulum Delivery System" sold by Reliance Medical Products, Inc. of Mason, Ohio.
It would therefore be desirable to provide an ophthalmic instrument delivery system as well as a programmable lighting system which would make examination of a patient by a doctor easier and which would provide for easier and fuller adjustment of both the instrument table and the room lighting conditions according to any specific doctor's requirements.